PSYCHOLOGIST |SEXOLOGIST | EDUCATOR

Sex without Consequences

It often seems that people who oppose things like sex education, birth control, equal rights for gay people and decriminalised sex work just want to make sure that no act of pleasure goes unpunished. We can’t have kids get easy access to condoms because good Lord they might think to use them. We can’t have women selling sexual services without someone being punished because that might send the message that’s it’s fine for two consenting adults to have sex for their own reasons. We can’t provide contraceptives because people might start to believe that you can just have sex and “we’ll have you covered“.

(Read that link by the way because omg Dan Savage yes)

It’s about the punishment of sex.

I wonder how we can change our cultural attitude towards sex. Because for me, sexual rights are not just about human rights and individual freedoms. Our attitude towards our bodies, our pleasure, our nature seems deeply disordered to me. Sex is good for us. Pleasure is good for us. Punishment is not. How wonderful would it be if we celebrated sexuality as a positive aspect of life, if we encouraged all forms of consensual pleasure and intimacy? The world would be a better place if we had more sex :).

Marijke Vonk is a Dutch sex-positive psychologist specialised in working with sexual minorities. Besides working as a therapist, she is a writer and lecturer on various topics concerning sexuality. Main topics on this blog include kink, gender equality, sex workers' rights, non-monogamy and psychology.